12 February
I am thoroughly settled and happily integrating between the traditional Indian lifestyle of Gokarna – in Karnataka, Southern India – and the Western tourists who flock here, mainly for the beaches.
I spend the whole day in town – the time flies in deep philosophical conversations about life, the world, relationships and God, had over chai (spiced tea) with various shop-owners (it’s just the way it is!) and now-familiar travellers.
My evenings are spent with Indian friends. They close shop at 10pm and I join them for dinner and a few laughs shared over the din of the corny Bollywood-movie songs blaring out of the television.
One living-room, with plenty of cushions laid out on a thin carpet, serves as a dining-room when a cloth is laid out to host the pots, pans and plates. We sit cross-legged, and eat with our hands, rolling the rice into a ball and popping it into our mouths with our thumb – like playing golf with dinner!
At night, two-inches-thick mattresses are rolled out over the carpet, and mosquito nets hung up, to make the bedroom. It certainly saves time and money on furniture and cleaning! I am accompanied during the 10-minute walk to my place, since in India everything goes to sleep and the streets are bare by about 10pm.
14 February
Gokarna has been transformed over the past week. Several stalls selling everything from gaudy gold-coloured bangles to kitchen-ware, from spices to devotional items, flank the streets. Hundreds of visitors walk through the village which, until only few days ago, was rather sleepy. All of them are anticipating Maha Shiva Ratri (Great Shiva Night), a festival celebrated throughout India but which has special significance here. Maha Shiva Ratri occurs during the last-moon crescent between February and March (the end of a lunar month called Magha or Masi in the Indian calendar). The big night this year is the 16th, but the nine-day-long celebrations are underway.
Each night an up-beat musical band comes down the street to announce that, “God is coming!” In Hindu culture a deity is not simply an icon of god, but God himself – who by his absolute infinite powers chooses to make himself finite solely to allow his devotees to serve him. The village people wait on the roadside with their offerings of incense, fruit, flowers and rupees, which are accepted via the head-priest sitting with the deity in the flashy carriage sporting Christmas lights!
15 February
Renzo, a traveller from Venice, takes me on a motorbike ride to Murdeshwar two hours away. We drive through scenes of water-
buffalo bathing by the roadside with a backdrop of chocolate-brown rock, red soil and lush green vegetation.
A giant statue of Lord Shiva welcomes us, and other statues depicting various important events in Hindu scripture are scattered all around a garden complete with restaurant overlooking a long white beach.
I am amused no end that this place, which looks like a Hindu theme park, has obviously been developed as a religious tourist attraction for Indians – so different from the Western conception of religion and entertainment!
Returning well after dark, we have a late dinner with our Kashmiri friends. About to head home at 1am, we find the streets alive – jolly music blaring too loudly from a nearby chai-wallah, shops still open... I am completely flabbergasted.
I am still wandering around at 2am, feeling totally at ease with so many people in the streets. I realise a long line of people is filing up for Shiva Puja – an ritual offering to Shiva in the temple. They hold bags with coconuts and bananas, incense, perfume and other items, but the line is so long it looks like they will be here all night.
16 February – Maha Shiva Ratri
Everybody is in an exceptionally good mood – especially the kids who receive gifts tonight – but by 11 o’clock most people have either retired to their homes or lain down to sleep in the shop alcoves, as there is not enough accommodation in the village to host everybody.
Surprised, I wander to the temples and get invited to take darshan of the Ganapati deity – thus the elephant-god Ganesh can see that I have visited his temple and be pleased with me! I feel quite privileged because, usually, Westerners are not allowed in most temples in Gokarna – they must be feeling generous due to the festival!
On leaving I hear that some activity will go on at the Kothi Theerta in the early hours of the morning, but the information is always so vague! Cat, a young English hippy who loves Shiva, and I go to sit at this huge water tank, which is considered holy. Hundreds of candles create a mystical shimmer in the water, but usually I wonder how it is that people have bathed and done their washing there everyday for decades, without an apparent flow.
Hindu stories are not unlike the tales of Greek mythology we may be more familiar with, except that these gods survive as reality, not as legends, to this day. Tonight’s celebrations of Shiva and Parvati’s “wedding party” – I was told by a widely-smiling local – bears witness!
We hear a big band playing and a palanquin carrying the deities is brought to the water’s edge. A boat profusely decorated with coloured flags takes the deities, the head-priest, and any other temple member who manages to squeeze in, for a cruise around the little temple in the centre of the tank.
Three times around and they emerge at the other end, going on a night parikrama (walk) in the back streets of Gokarna towards the beach where the temples are. We walk over elaborate chalk drawings on the ground outside people’s homes, with “Wel-come’” printed below. Ghee lamps are offered to the deity as the band continues to play and people chant various mantras in unison. I have to say it is quite energising – “full-power” as they like to say!
Even more exhilarating is the pulling of the car, or chariot. Several metres high and brightly decorated, the village people pull it up the aptly named Car Street – the main street of Gokarna – and back, on ropes about five inches thick.
Of course I join in and have a tug, and find myself chanting, “Hara Hara Mahadev” (Hara is another name for Shiva, maha means “great” and dev means “god”) with the rest of them, sweating profusely as I do. Hey, the experience is really great! I cannot quite explain it.
As the Brahman (priest) brings the deity down from the car when the show is over, I have to smile that a mobile phone is attached to his dhoti (the length of cloth which is traditional male Indian dress).
The palanquin carrying the deities speeds off towards the main temple, and I follow it right inside! Again I feel privileged – I get darshan of the Linga, black and gold, and ring the bells overhead joining the rest of the crowd!
Doors shut, everybody crowds into a corner of the temple to receive some holy remnants of food offerings (usually consisting of sugar) and leaves the temple feeling happy.
18 February
Gokarna is essentially a Brahmin village – Brahmanas are the priestly class of people whose duty is to worship the gods on behalf of man through fire-ceremonies and daily rituals in the temples. They are strict vegetarians and have a particular code of conduct within Indian society. Most of Gokarna’s inhabitants, however, include fish in their daily diet.
The Brahmanas of Gokarna take great pride in their role but, it can be told, are not all necessarily of saintly despondency! They are known to have become quite aggressive when foreigners have attempted to view “their” deities over the years.
As I see the bananas flying towards the bigger car, which is pulled only once a year on the 11st of Phalguna – the new-moon between February and March marking the beginning of the next lunar month – I wonder if the village people and tourists are aiming at the car or at the Brahmanas.
I have been told that the bananas are meant as an offering as the car goes past, promising returns five-fold.
The first three episodes of Melanie Drury’s diary were published on 22 January, 5 February and 19 February. Episode 5 is due to be
published on 5 March
www.melaniedrury.com;
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